HUNT: A New Generation of Underwater High-energy Neutrino Telescope for the Future

Scientific goal For more than a century, the origin of cosmic rays has been a lasting mystery, challenging scientists to reveal the process and source behind these high-energy particles. High-energy neutrinos can propagate over long distances without the influence of magnetic field or matter, and have become an indispensable tool to explore the origin of cosmic rays, providing unique insights into their generation mechanism and astrophysical sources. The LHAASO team of the Institute of High Energy Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences put forward the High-energy Underwater Neutrino Telescope (HUNT) project, with a detector volume of about 30 cubic kilometers, aiming at detecting high-energy neutrino point sources inside and outside the Milky Way in a short time. It is expected that dozens of sources will be observed within ten years, which will lead the development of neutrino astronomy.
Status The HUNT project relies on three scientific experiments, namely LHAASO, Deep Network China and Baikal-GVD, and has gathered the participation of nearly 20 scientific research units and more than 150 researchers in China. The HUNT project has completed four rounds of deepwater tests in South China Sea and Lake Baikal respectively. At present, a small prototype array with 7 strings and 56 OMs is being built in South China Sea, and it is expected to measure atmospheric neutrinos.

一个多世纪以来，宇宙射线的起源一直是一个持久之谜，挑战科学家们去揭示这些高能粒子背后的过程和来源。高能中微子能够不受磁场或物质的影响进行远距离传播，已经成为探索宇宙射线起源的不可或缺的工具，为其产生机制和天体物理来源提供了独特的见解。
中国科学院高能物理研究所的LHAASO团队提出了高能水下中微子望远镜(HUNT)项目，它的探测器体积约为30立方公里，目的是在短期内探测到银河系内和银河系外的高能中微子点源，有望在十年内观测到数十个源，将引领中微子天文领域的发展。
HUNT项目依托LHAASO、深网和Baikal-GVD等三大科学实验，已经凝聚到中国的近20家科研单位和200名科研人员的参与。HUNT项目分别在中国南海和贝加尔湖已经完成四轮次的海试工作。目前，正在中国南海推动建设一个7串含56个探头的小型样机阵列，有望实测到大气中微子事例。